Saturday, September 24, 2016

SHINE in the Sunshine City and a #giveaway

Character: Savannah Webb

Series: Webb’s Glass Shop MysteriesAuthor: Cheryl Hollon

Hi there, I’m Savannah Webb, owner of Webb’s Glass Shop on Central Avenue in St. Petersburg, Florida. It’s September. That means
I’m ready for summer to be over but not quite ready for Pun’kin Spice beer or
Coffee. Although the temperatures still climb into the 90’s, there’s a subtle
change in the mornings. If you’ve lived here for a few years, you know to look
for a freshening of the breeze and a lowering of the oppressive humidity. Fall
is not yet around the corner – more like down the street a few blocks – and
we’re looking forward to its arrival.

At Webb’s Glass Shop, September is the start of the slow
ramp up to our busiest season. Students are back and taking classes. Retirees
are back from and taking classes. The Canadians are down and taking
classes. You get the trend, right? From now through December, we’ll enjoy the
influx of lots of students.

The premier event of September is the SHINE festival – Made up of local artists and community members, SHINE is an art project, intended to illuminate the power of art in public spaces by revitalizing areas, inspiring dialogue and uniting our community--while cultivating new standards of artistic excellence and reflecting St. Petersburg's creative and vibrant spirit. It lasts for a mere ten
days, but the effects of the fresh new murals revitalizes our section of
Central Avenue and gives the district a yes, you guessed it, a SHINE. Here’s a
picture of the my favorite mural in this year’s competition by @arlin_graff who unleashes this cheetah on the 600 block of Central Avenue.

New this year is a colorful geometric mural by Alex Pardee at Martin Luther King Street between 2nd and 3rd Avenue North. See, it really is the intersection. They finished it minutes before it began to rain. You can't help but smile when you see its beauty and color.

Well, I’ve got to get back to the shop. We have more ideas
for new classes: recycling wine bottles, sand etching on clear glass, mosaic
creations and I have an idea to start teaching flame work glass beading. Sign up
for a class! Your local business will love you.

#####

There’s a giveaway! Add a comment with your e-mail in the
form: name at network dot com (so that the spam bots won’t catch you) and
you’re entered for a chance to win a recycled beer bottle and a signed copy
of CRACKED TO DEATH (Webb’s Glass Shop Mystery, Book #3). This giveaway is open
to US residents only. Your comment must be dated no later than midnight September 26.
Thank you for your support to this blog and to cozy mysteries.

#####

You
can read more about Savannah in Cracked
to Death, the third book in the Webb’s Glass Shop Mysteries, published by
Kensington Books. Available at your favorite book vendor.

About
Cracked to Death:

When a treasure hunt leads to deadly plunder, it’s up to
glass shop owner Savannah Webb and her trusty investigative posse to map out
the true motives of a killer . . .

It's
the dog days of summer in St. Petersburg, Florida, and Webb's Glass Shop
proprietor Savannah Webb has an eco-friendly plan to help locals escape the
heat--a recyclable bottle-crafting workshop taught by reticent store manager
Amanda Blake. Turns out, the class is a bigger smash than expected, thanks in
part to a pair of staggeringly old bottles brought in by snorkeler Martin Lane
. . .

Linked
to a storied pirate shipwreck, the relics definitely pique Savannah's interest.
But intrigue turns to shock when Martin's lifeless body washes ashore the next
morning, another glass artifact tucked in his dive bag. With cell phone records
connecting Amanda to the drowning, Savannah must voyage through uncharted
territory to exonerate her colleague and capture the twisted criminal behind
Martin's death . . .

Meet
the author:

Cheryl
Hollon writes full time after she left an engineering career designing and
building military flight simulators in amazing countries such as England,
Wales, Australia, Singapore, Taiwan and India. Fulfilling the dream of a
lifetime, she combines her love of writing with a passion for creating glass
art. In the small glass studio behind the house, Cheryl and her husband George
design, create, and produce fused glass, stained glass and painted glass
artworks.

A Shine Festival sounds like it would be a lot of fun. When I lived in Pittsburgh they had an Art Festival every year, it was interesting to see all the different forms and ideas that people came up with. momzillasteel at gmail dot com

Thanks for sharing the Shine Festival with us -- beautiful colors and designs. I love the idea of a re-purposed beer bottle and would love to have one. Thanks so much for the giveaway! bobandcelia@sbcglobal.net

Would love to read about what they made from the recycled glass. A friend gave me recycled stained glass from a landfill and I made a picture of a man and woman holding hands. Exciting what you can do with recycled stuff.

The cover of this book just looks too good to pass up. Would love to read this book. I am imagining that there will be a lot about the area in the book. Thanks for the giveaway Georgiaqueenvictoria50 (at) aol (dot) com

Hello! This book sounds very interesting! I love the cozy mysteries and have never read any with this type of glass artwork. I always take a book with me to my Chemotherapy treatments, and then, after I am done reading it, I leave it on a table for the other ladies to pick up and read. Thanks for the chance to win the bottle and the book! Patty pc1977@zoominternet.net

Welcome

We are the characters--major and minor--who inhabit the pages of some of your favorite cozy mysteries.We're coming out from between the covers and welcoming you into our lives.So grab a nice cuppa, settle in, and learn what happens when our authors aren't looking.